Links for 2022-03-19
The Deep VZN program aims to discover new pandemic-grade viruses and publish their genomes to the world. It is estimated that there are currently around 30,000 people who could then easily build them. https://www.samharris.org/podcasts/making-sense-episodes/making-sense-presents-recipes-for-future-plagues
“I used OpenAI’s newest code model to make simple versions of games like Wordle, VR mazes and Zelda ENTIRELY through natural language.^I told it what I wanted and did ZERO editing/coding.” https://andrewmayneblog.wordpress.com/2022/03/17/building-games-and-apps-entirely-through-natural-language-using-openais-davinci-code-model/
DeepMind's New AI: As Smart As An Engineer... Kind Of! https://youtu.be/x_cxDgR1x-c
Long Document Summarization with Top-down and Bottom-up Inference. Can summarize an entire book and achieve competitive performance using 0.27% parameters (464M vs. 175B) and much less training data, compared to a recent GPT-3-based model. https://arxiv.org/abs/2203.07586
Transframer can generate coherent 30 second videos from a single image without any explicit geometric information. https://arxiv.org/abs/2203.09494
“Control and Correlation...We see that despite being causally related, gas and brake aren’t correlated with speed at all.” https://slimemoldtimemold.com/2022/03/15/control-and-correlation/
Moore’s Law: Scientists Just Made a Graphene Transistor Gate the Width of an Atom https://singularityhub.com/2022/03/13/moores-law-scientists-just-made-a-graphene-transistor-gate-the-width-of-an-atom/
Topological qubits are controlled by a fundamental property called the topological gap. Learn how Microsoft Quantum researchers have observed a 30 μeV topological gap, showing that the underlying physics behind their approach to quantum computing is sound https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/research/blog/microsoft-has-demonstrated-the-underlying-physics-required-to-create-a-new-kind-of-qubit/
The Rejuvenome: Goals and Design — “The Rejuvenome is designed to uncover the effects of aging-interventions (treatments targeting the biological processes of aging) throughout the entire body, spanning molecular and cellular changes to functional differences of individual organs and the body as a whole.” https://astera.org/the-rejuvenome-goals-and-design/
Preprint server removes ‘inflammatory’ papers in superconductor controversy https://www.science.org/content/article/preprint-server-removes-inflammatory-papers-superconductor-controversy
Who Should We Fear More: Biohackers, Disgruntled Postdocs, or Bad Governments? A Simple Risk Chain Model of Biorisk https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7310205/
Over the past decade (2011-2020) China's per-capita GDP increased by a staggering 70%, while their per-capita (domestic) emissions only increased 7%. https://ourworldindata.org/co2-gdp-decoupling
"An elite Ukrainian drone unit has destroyed dozens of “priority targets” by attacking Russian forces as they sleep...Using heavy-duty octocopter drones which are modified to drop anti-tank grenades and to see with thermal cameras...We look specifically for the most valuable truck in the convoy and then we hit it precisely...Their fleet ranges from cheap commercial drones to their most important asset: heavy, custom-built octocopters maintained by in-house engineers...The r18 model is the jewel of their arsenal, boasting a 4km range, 40-minute flight time and capacity to drop 5kg bombs that obliterate russian armour...As well as utilising public communications channels where hundreds of civilian drone fliers have mobilised to push back President Putin’s forces, Aerorozvidka relies on a secure Starlink satellite system donated to them by Elon Musk. The unit was created by model plane enthusiasts in 2014 but since the success of its operations against Russian forces in Crimea it has been integrated into the Ukrainian general staff." https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/specialist-drone-unit-picks-off-invading-forces-as-they-sleep-zlx3dj7bb
How worried should you be about radiation from nuclear accidents?
Some links:
1. UN finds 'no adverse health effects from Fukushima disaster: “No adverse health effects among Fukushima residents have been documented that are directly attributable to radiation exposure from the FDNPS accident.” https://www.unscear.org/docs/publications/2020/UNSCEAR_2020_AnnexB_AdvanceCopy.pdf
2. The children of the survivors of Chernobyl do not have excess mutations. It is consistent with a worldview that radiations are less harmful to our biology than commonly assumed. https://www.science.org/content/article/no-excess-mutations-children-chernobyl-survivors-new-study-finds
3. Researchers find few adverse health effects in wildlife exposed to low levels of radiation from the Fukushima nuclear accident https://cvmbs.source.colostate.edu/researchers-find-few-adverse-health-effects-in-wildlife-exposed-to-low-levels-of-radiation-from-the-fukushima-nuclear-accident/
4. It Sounds Crazy, But Fukushima, Chernobyl, And Three Mile Island Show Why Nuclear Is Inherently Safe https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaelshellenberger/2019/03/11/it-sounds-crazy-but-fukushima-chernobyl-and-three-mile-island-show-why-nuclear-is-inherently-safe/
5. Chernobyl at 35 Years: An Oncologist’s Perspective: “The bottom line is there are few data to suggest that radiation released from Chernobyl increased cancer globally...no convincing data that birth defects or genetic abnormalities were increased...” https://ascopost.com/news/april-2021/chernobyl-at-35-years-an-oncologist-s-perspective/
6. Long-Term Effects of the Rain Exposure Shortly after the Atomic Bombings in Hiroshima and Nagasaki: "For incidence of solid cancer and leukemia, no significantly elevated rain exposure risks were observed in either city." https://rrjournal.org/doi/full/10.1667/RR13822.1
7. Low-dose radiation from A-bombs elongated lifespan and reduced cancer mortality relative to un-irradiated individuals (Sutou, 2018) https://genesenvironment.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s41021-018-0114-3
8. Life expectancy is approximately 2.5 years longer in people living in areas with an elevated background radiation in the USA. https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/832949v1
9. The cancer mortality in high natural radiation areas in Poland is lower in the higher radiation level areas. https://ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3526327/
10. Evidence That Lifelong Low Dose Rates of Ionizing Radiation Increase Lifespan in Long- and Short-Lived Dogs https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/1559325817692903
11. Statistically significant decreases in mortality, with very large effect sizes, were observed in high land elevation for three of the four outcomes, including cancer. https://ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3057635/
12. When mice were exposed to radiation doses about 400 times greater than background levels for five weeks, no DNA damage could be detected. http://news.mit.edu/2012/prolonged-radiation-exposure-0515
13. Birds in the exclusion zone around Chernobyl are adapting to -- and may even be benefiting from -- long-term exposure to radiation. Prolonged exposure to low doses of radiation increases organisms' resistance to larger, subsequent doses. https://sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/04/140424223057.htm